Open Letter to the Editorial Board of theLeipziger Volkszeitung[2]

Written:Written after June 12 (25), 1905Published:First published in 1931 inLenin Miscellany XVI.

      Published according to the manuscript. Translated from the German.Source:Lenin
	  Collected Works,

      Foreign Languages Publishing House,1962,

      Moscow,Volume 8,

      pages531-533.Translated:Bernard Isaacs and The Late Isidor LaskerTranscription\Markup:R. CymbalaPublic Domain:Lenin Internet Archive

      (2003).You may freely copy, distribute,
	display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and
	commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet
	Archive” as your source.•README

DearComrades,

Inissue No. 135 of theLeipziger VolkszeitungComrade Karl Kautsky
writes on the split in the Russian Social-Democracy. We feel compelled to ask
that you publish our reply to Kautsky’s attacks and to allow us to refute the
factual inaccuracies which his article contains. We shall be brief.

Kautskysays that “the German edition of the resolutions adopted at the
recent Russian Congress could not have appeared at a more inopportune
moment”, that the resolutions “will give most readers a totally
false picture of the relations that exist in the Russian
Social-Democracy”. Kautsky goes so far as to propose to the German comrades
that they should not make these resolutions public.

Wetake the liberty of pointing out that nothing could give our German comrades
a better idea of the relations within the Russian Social-Democracy than the
original resolutions of the Third Congress of the Russian Social-Democratic
Labour Party, as well as the resolutions of the “conference” held
by the new-Iskrists.

Wedeclare that Kautsky is making a great mistake in writing on matters of
which, at best, he knows only by hear say, and that his picture of the relations
that exist in the Russian Social-Democracy is a highly distorted one. It is
utterly ridiculous, for instance, to hear Kautsky suggest that “the
resolutions [of the Third Congress of the R.S.D.L.P.] may have lost their
significance at thepresent moment even for those who

			       drafted[1]them”. Many unity negotiations
      between us and the new-Iskrists have been held in the course of the past
      two or three months, hut the outcome of these negotiations so far has
      amounted to nothing.

Westrongly protest against the attempt to silence us in the German
Social-Democratic press by means of such a crude, mechanical, and unheard-of
method as boycotting a pamphlet which contains only a translation of
the resolutions of the Third Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. and which was
issued by the Munich
Party publishing house of the Social-Democratic Labour Party of Germany (G. Birk
& Co.). Kautsky has no right to speak about his impartiality. He has always
been partial as regards the present struggle with in the Russian
Social-Democracy. This is his right, of course. But one who is partial would do
better not to speak too much of impartiality, if he does not want to be accused
of hypocrisy.

Kautskytries to make out that all the resolutions of the Third Congress of the
R.S.D.L.P. are “attacks by Lenin and his friends against Plekhanov and his
friends”. We have three brief remarks to make on this score. In the first
place, only four of the seventeen resolutions directly or indirectly touch on
our opponents within the R.S.D.L.P. Secondly, Plekhanov has now retired from the
Editorial Board ofIskra(seeIskra, No. 101). This shows how
little Kautsky understands our relations. Thirdly, we would ask the German
comrades to consider the impression that is likely to be created on the Russian
Social-Democrats when a man with Kautsky’s authority tries to discredit the work
of an entire Party Congress by “representing” it as “attacks
by Lenin and his friends”. What would people in Germany think of men who
(without having read the record of the proceedings) presumed to represent the
deliberations, say, of the Dresden Party Congress as an attack by Kautsky and
his friends...?

Aword of warning to all the German Social-Democrats:
Comrades! If you really consider the R.S.D.L.P. to be a fraternal party, do not
believe a word of what the so-called impartial Germans tell you about our
split. Insist on seeingthe documents, the authentic documents. And do not forget that
prejudice is further from the truth than ignorance.

WithSocial-Democratic greetings,

The Editorial Board of the Central Organ (“Proletary”)
of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party

P.S.The French socialists’ idea of impartiality differs from that of
the Germans. Their Central OrganLe Socialistehas just
published a translation of the resolutions of the Third Congress of
the R.S.D.L.P. in a special supplement.

[1]Misprinted “hated” in theLeipziger Volkszettung.—Lenin

[2]“Open Letter to the Editorial Board of the
’Leipsiger Volkszeitung’\thinspace"was written by Lenin in answer to an article by
Kautsky, “The Split in Russian Social-Democracy”, published in theLeipsiger Volkszeitung.In a letter to the Central Committee of the
R.S.D.L.P. dated June 29 (July 12) Lenin wrote in regard to Kautsky’s article:
“Kautsky has published a mean article on the German edition of the
’Report’\thinspace", that is, the Report on the Third Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. Lenin’s
“Open Letter” was not published by the news
 paper.